Posted on 07/25/2002 5:58:32 AM PDT by Clive
Harare - An American food relief expert urged the Zimbabwean government to drop restrictions on the import of maize that could not be certified free of genetically modified material, saying the food was the only way to avert starvation in the country.
The US maize was safe, Roger Winter, a senior USAid official who visited food relief distribution centres in northeastern Zimbabwe, said on Tuesday.
"It is the same food that Americans eat every day. It is the same food that has been approved by our Environmental Protection Agency," he said. "We want to help in this food emergency but we don't have a substitute (for the maize) and the volumes are not available anywhere else."
Aid agencies have warned that almost half the country faces starvation as famine looms, caused in part by President Robert Mugabe's controversial land redistribution programme to transfer the country's white-owned farms to landless blacks. The violence and chaos accompanying the seizures has brought commercial agriculture to a standstill.
Erratic rainfall has also contributed to the food shortage.
The US government has been outspoken in its criticism of the land seizures.
'No famine on my watch'
On Tuesday, Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe accused western nations of using aid to try and pressurise the government to change its policies.
"We certainly abhor sinister interests, which seek surreptitiously to advance themselves under cover of humanitarian assistance," Mugabe said.
Winter declined to respond, saying the United States was only interested in preventing famine.
"If there is inadequate action to prevent famine, people will die because there is nobody to make up for the role the US is prepared to play," he said. "President Bush ... has told us he does not want famine on his watch."
There was no immediate government response to Winter's appeal.
In May the government rejected a 10 000 ton donation of maize from the United States because it could not be certified that it was not genetically modified.
Zimbabwean officials have not said specifically why they object to genetically modified food. But some scientists have been concerned that genes from modified field crops would so thoroughly invade nearby fields that no field crops could ever be completely free of the effects of the new gene manipulation techniques.
Zimbabwe has to date bought 500 000 tons of maize from South Africa, Brazil, China and Kenya without questioning whether it was genetically modified. Much of the maize is still in transit due to logistical problems.
Zimbabwe had accepted all other food shipments to the country without reservation, a spokesperson for the US Embassy in South Africa said. No other countries in southern Africa receiving US aid expressed concern that shipments may contain genetically modified food, the spokesperson said. - Sapa-AP
PRAYER FOCUS: National crisis in Zimbabwe
The nation of Zimbabwe is in a major crisis. Several days ago the news came in that 6 million of the 12 million people in Zimbabwe are on the verge of starvation. There is a major drought in this nation which could be one of the worst in the history of the world unless God intervenes. At this time, President Mugabe's primary focus is not caring for his people but demanding all white farmers to leave their farms by August 2002. Kadafi of Libya is trying to buy land in Zimbabwe.
Langton Gatsi, a Christian leader from Zimbabwe, requests prayer: "Let's pray that before the end of August 2002, President Mugabe will repent and receive Jesus or that God will intervene and a God fearing leader would lead Zimbabwe. Pray also for humanitarian help to come directly to the people in Zimbabwe. Also, that God would open the heavens with an abundance of natural and spiritual rain in this nation."
The Christians in Zimbabwe are calling a 40-day fast starting July 12, 2002 until August 21, 2002, which is the beginning of the annual national prayer conference of Zimbabwe. We ask you to prayerfully consider joining the Zimbabwean Christians in this 40-day fast for the fullness of political, spiritual and natural breakthroughs, that at this critical time, Zimbabwe will begin to come into her prophetic destiny in God.
Source: Langton Gatsi through Jerusalem House of Prayer for All Nations
And the God of the Bible can and does act. Our problem today is, we try to be nicer than God, and ignore one of the most potent weapons in our arsenal, the imprecatory psalms.
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